Charlotte Regional Indicators Project

Go to this site created by UNCC Urban Institute to get a wealth of data, charts, and speculation about the 14 county Charlotte Region.  Normally I would limit my focus to just downtown Charlotte information, but found this to be extremely valuable.  Listed below is information directly from the "About The Project" from the website.

The quality of life or well-being of a community is measured by many social, economic, and environmental factors. In the Charlotte region, it has become increasingly evident that these factors can only be effectively measured and addressed by crossing political boundaries and looking at the entire geographic area or region. Successful regional approaches to maintaining and enhancing the quality of life require tracking and assessing trends over time.

The Charlotte Regional Indicators Project does just that. It provides critical benchmarks measured over time and compared to state and/or national data for the 14-county, 2-state region, which includes Anson, Cabarrus, Catawba, Cleveland, Gaston, Iredell, Lincoln, Mecklenburg, Rowan, Stanly, and Union counties in North Carolina and Chester, Lancaster, and York counties in South Carolina. The Indicators Project provides objective, reliable, and relevant data that measure the region’s annual progress on a wide range of indicators that impact the region’s quality of life.

The Indicators Project focuses on ten theme areas: Arts, Recreation, and Cultural Life; the Economy; Education; the Environment; Government and Citizen Participation; Health; Housing; Public Safety; Social Well-Being; and Transportation, plus Demographics. Individually, the ten theme areas represent critical components of the region’s quality of life. Collectively, the ten theme areas provide a holistic framework that allows the region to better understand the inter-relationships among them.